3 min learnOsloJun 1, 2026 07:04 AM IST
It’s beginning to occur once more. That juggernaut known as Magnus Carlsen is beginning to collect momentum to chase one other title at Norway Chess, nonetheless absurd it sounds this time round. In spite of everything, it was solely yesterday that Carlsen was on the backside of the standings.
A infamous gradual starter at tournaments lately, it could have felt like Carlsen had left it too late to energy one other title problem. Regardless of experiencing an unprecedented three losses in 5 video games — to Alireza Firouzja, R Praggnanandhaa and Wesley So — thus far on the event in Oslo, Carlsen is simply 4 factors behind event chief Wesley So after he took down the French-Iranian Firouzja in a classical sport by enjoying “outdated man chess”.
Strolling into the sport on Sunday, Carlsen was requested to fee from 1 to 10 how a lot of a temper he was in to struggle. “1.5,” Carlsen had shrugged earlier than strolling away.
However on the board, he had opted for an old-school opening trick to try to catch the younger Firouzja off-guard.
“I’m making an attempt a correct outdated man transfer once more right now, simply enjoying one thing that was common earlier than Alireza began enjoying chess,” laughed Carlsen in an early go to to the confession sales space on Sunday.
Carlsen then defined that the road he had pulled out towards Firouzja had been sharpened by his staff through the world chess championship battle towards Sergey Karjakin (in New York again in 2016). He had performed the road in his first sport with black towards the Russian challenger.
“However folks stopped enjoying this line,” Carlsen added. “As a result of it doesn’t work! Let’s see when he is aware of.”
Story continues under this advert
The opening did make Firouzja assume, because the Norwegian world no 1 carved up a near-15-minute benefit by the thirteenth transfer.
The sport noticed Firouzja put down his injured proper leg from its elevated chair. He handed Carlsen a bonus with an error on the twenty eighth transfer earlier than making a number of errors to extend Carlsen’s benefit on the board, till he resigned on transfer 55.
Carlsen’s win got here on a day each the younger Indian challengers — world champion D Gukesh and Praggnanandhaa — had suffered defeats. Due to Sunday’s outcomes at Oslo’s Deichman Bjørvika, Carlsen shot previous the Indian duo into fourth place. Whereas Pragg misplaced to Wesley So, Gukesh slipped to a different defeat, this time to his world chess championship second, Vincent Keymer.
Carlsen can push for a run on the title with 4 extra video games remaining within the event. Two of these video games will probably be towards the Indian prodigies.
Story continues under this advert
The day, in truth, noticed the opposite two Indians in motion — Divya Deshmukh and Koneru Humpy — additionally lose, with the latter dropping in Armageddon towards Bibisara Assaubayeva after the classical sport led to a brief 15-move draw. Bibisara’s win, coupled with Deshmukh’s loss to girls’s world champion Ju Wenjun, meant that the Kazakh grandmaster overtook Deshmukh on the prime of the ladies’s leaderboard.
(The author is in Oslo on the invitation of Norway Chess)